Nevertheless....a "trophy" is obviously relative. I'm happy with any striper I can catch from the beach regardless of tackle but would consider a fly rod 30lber a fish of a lifetime and doubt I'll ever get one that large. I've caught hundreds of fly rod stripers from the surf and none were even close to #30.

Boat fishing? Whole different story. It's really not that hard, with a good guide, under the right conditions....to catch a 30lb bass at a place like the CBBT or Outer Banks on a fly and even easier still using eels or live lining bunker.

A 30lber from terra firma with the long rod....Pretty extraordinary in my opinion. (bowing down with outstretched hands).

Agreed. I was lucky to catch a few that pushed 30" with sand in my toes...let alone 30lbs. I've seen some monsters pulled in on cape cod and cape anne in april by spin casters, but those fish were a county mile cast for the spinners and would rarely get close enough for me to to consider.But hey, put your time in and catch the right moment! That's what makes it fun!

I spent literally 3 years living in my van to get those fish, 4-5 days out of the week starting in april till late dec. worked hard for them too. did get lots of fish up to 20 lbs+. above that had to work harder for them. have chased them from cape cod to cape hatteras for years.

sandfly wrote:I spent literally 3 years living in my van to get those fish, 4-5 days out of the week starting in april till late dec. worked hard for them too.

I'm envious too - definitely the life (yuh gotta love that van).

I'm a bit hard headed about this since we've got a lot of FFers on this forum who don't saltwater fish or fish stripers but are curious about the game....and I want them to understand how rare a catch like this is. A bass of this weight is typically in the 42-45 inch range and 12 to 15 years old. Fish this size are not especially rare and sometimes show up in schools of this size (or bigger) but catches of this size don't happen everyday and I wanted our readers unfamiliar with surf fishing to recognize how unique this is for a fly fishermen who fishes the beach. Open any saltwater magazine or hit any website and they're full of pics of guys hoisting cows (giant stripers) but these are almost never fly rod fish and fewer still were caught from surf or jetty by an FFer. In fact, this is the only pic I've seen in all of 2010 of a genuine surf caught fly rod #30 striper. I thought about conducting a google search but didn't feel like wasting time. Were there others like it caught? Almost certainly but I'm betting you'd have to look real hard to find another surf/jetty caught 30 pounder taken by an FFer last year.

Nevertheless....a "trophy" is obviously relative. I'm happy with any striper I can catch from the beach regardless of tackle but would consider a fly rod 30lber a fish of a lifetime and doubt I'll ever get one that large. I've caught hundreds of fly rod stripers from the surf and none were even close to #30.

Boat fishing? Whole different story. It's really not that hard, with a good guide, under the right conditions....to catch a 30lb bass at a place like the CBBT or Outer Banks on a fly and even easier still using eels or live lining bunker.

A 30lber from terra firma with the long rod....Pretty extraordinary in my opinion. (bowing down with outstretched hands).

Fishidiot: You ever read any Frank Dagnault? He has a line in one of his books, I can't recall if he was quoting one of his buddies or if they were his words, but he says, "I'd rather have a sister in a whore house than a brother in a boat." Pretty harsh, but the guys who showed me how to fish stripers from the beach were of the same mind. They were hard-core, old-school night fisherman. I can't say that I hate boat guys like those guys seemed to, but I really don't fish them from a boat unless it's a sight fishing on the flats. I'm a beach guy.

Those fish I mentioned were beach fish. My best fly-rod fish from the beach was 37 lbs. and my best fish on spinning gear was 44 lbs.--both were nighttime fish. In 15 years of fishing stripers in the surf I've caught six over 30 on the fly--all of them at night and four of them coming from the same night time blitz.

Do you fish in the daytime primarily? I ask because, where I fish, I can honestly say that I've never seen a striper over 25 lbs. caught in the day time (excluding dawn). But I can't tell you how many over 25 I've seen caught and caught myself, many of them on the fly, at night. I think that is the primary reason most fly fisherman don't get bigger stripers--they are fishing for them at the wrong time.

As for 30 lb. fly-rod fish last year, I know of two others, and I'm sure there were more. Nighttime striper guys are as tightlipped a group of fisherman as you'll ever run across, mean too. I once saw a fist fight break out when a guy took a picture of a nice fish he had just landed. A guy just down the beach from him started it because he figured the camera flash would tell others down the beach that there were fish on the point we were fishing. The two 30s I mentioned were caught by my nephew, a shore guide on Martha's Vineyard, and a guy he was fishing with. Both were caught from the beach during a nighttime blitz.

I never made a cast in the New England surf last year, but the year before I ran into another night blitz with the same nephew and a brother of mine. We were fishing a jetty and I landed a 28 on the fly, my nephew landed a bona-fide 30 (one of three for him that year but he fishes almost every night and uses nothing but the fly rod) and my brother, who was fishing plugs, landed one 30 and one that likely went 42-44 lbs. We had a 30 lb. boga with us so we couldn't get an accurate read but it taped out at 46".

So that's my take. In my experience, if you want big fish from the beach, fish at night and better yet, at night during the spring migration. And they can be had on the fly pole. They are surf-zone fish after all, especially at night.

Don't get me wrong, I totally agree that a fish over 30 is an accomplishment (increasingly so where I fish over the past 5 years, whether on fly or gear), but in my experience they aren't as rare as you make them out to be, and a lot more of them get caught than you hear about. 40s on the other hand, I don't think I've ever hooked one on a fly rod and don't know many people who have from the beach.

On another note, I was talking with Popovics and a couple of guys from Shore Catch recently and they were telling me that the night fishing in Jersey has really fallen off over the past few years. They were saying they thought there was just so much big bait off shore that the fish have little need to go hunting the beach at night. They also admitted that they don’t go out at night as often as they used to.

Sorry for the long post. I love talking about stripers, especially since I don't get to fish for them too often any more.

YRG, My apologies for implying you'd caught the big guy on spin gear or from a boat (got confused by the chatter about plugs and eels). Clearly, you've walked the walk and I salute yuh.

Yes, I own Frank Diagnalt's books.....and yes, I do a lot of fishing at night. Of course, you're correct that most trophy jetty/surf caught bass are caught at night. I've seen some amazing big fish come up on the sand or rocks from Montauk to Indian River Inlet but even on nights when they were getting caught frequently, it always was plug and eel guys and Yours Truly with his fly rod (and other FFers I watched) just couldn't stick the cows. Since I usually drive to the beach by myself, I've cut back on hard core night fishing some years ago after a close call when driving home sleet deprived. Like any surf fishermen, I do love dawn and dusk.

I stand by my claim that a surf/jetty caught striper on a fly over 30 lbs is an extraordinary achievement and exceedingly rare.

fishidiot,have you ever fished the trough north of the Indian river inlet. used to be marker showing the end of the beach buggy area and the surfing area began. come in right above there and ran parallel to the beach. seen a lot of big fish run the beach there. used to fish sharks there alot.

sandfly wrote:fishidiot,have you ever fished the trough north of the Indian river inlet. used to be marker showing the end of the beach buggy area and the surfing area began. come in right above there and ran parallel to the beach. seen a lot of big fish run the beach there. used to fish sharks there alot.

Yes, but it's been probably 17 or 18 years. I think you're referring to the spot local folks call the "north pocket?" Very similiar situation to what you see at IBSP down at the jetty. Had some great bluefish action at that spot.

Your not jokin there, we must have bumped into one another back then. I used to hang at Herb's bait & tackle. Just about lived at that spot when i was down there. also fenwick and cape henlopen. can't forget the big weakies in the old channel back behind the coast guard station.

sandfly wrote:Your not jokin there, we must have bumped into one another back then. I used to hang at Herb's bait & tackle. Just about lived at that spot when i was down there. also fenwick and cape henlopen. can't forget the big weakies in the old channel back behind the coast guard station.

Yeah, the good ole days. Is Herb's still in business? I never fished back of the Coast Guard station as I was strictly a shore fisherman but often heard about great catches there. I had a souped up beat-to-heck 71 Ford Maverick with a built 302 and 4 speed. Used to sleep in my car at the parking lot at Indian River and fish all night. In 1994 I was driving out of Cape Henlopen SP and was rear-ended by a truck pulling a large camper. Fortunately, nobody was hurt but the old Maverick was a total loss (bluebook value of $50). The glory of youth. Thanks for the memories.

I'm going to be spending a week just north of Indian River this summer and ought to be able to set aside a night or two to fish. Probably mid June. Any advice?

To be honest, what I know about IR is way dated. Hopefully Sandfly or someone else can get some new, more relevant info up.

With that said, if it were me, I'd be optimistic. June is a good month (only drawback is lots of summer tourists crowding Dewey Beach etc). I'm only familiar with the north side of the inlet however there is good public access for a walk-on angler and (at least in the past) nightime accessibility. For night FFing, I'd use a 10-12WT with fast sink line and heavy tippet. IR is narrower than Barnegat and really rips when the tide is moving. Swing a large, dark night fly of your preferance right up close to the rocks with a moving tide. As is typical of saltwater, game fish forage into the current, but often are right against the rocks when the current is strong. If the inlet doesn't produce, cast northward from the jetty into the surf zone. If there is a breeze from the north/Ne, it can corral fish here not to mention bass foraging the surf line at night will also get into this pocket. It used to be that IR saw a nice weakfish run in the spring (not sure what its been like in recent years). If you can keep your fly low and slow don't be surprised if night fishing gets you hooked up with one of these guys. Weaks run large in spring and early summer and tend to be nocturnal.Good luck with your trip.